Teenage hacking menace jailed for 11 months

A teenage hacker who ran a botnet of compromised machines and made fake 911 emergency calls has been jailed for 11 months, The Boston Heraldreports.

The 17 year-old, from Worcester, Massachusetts, referred to in court papers only by his initials DH or online nickname DShocker, confessed to using a botnet to run denial of service attacks against adversaries from the online gaming and IRC scenes. He also admitted using stolen credit card details to make fraudulent purchases as well as making spoof phone calls to the emergency services during a three year reign of malicious mischief.

DShocker made spoof phone calls to police and reported non-existent emergencies, such as hostage situations or bomb threats, in order to prompt the dispatch of police SWAT teams to the homes of rivals, a practice known as "swatting". He obtained his victims' phone numbers and addresses after breaking into the systems of their ISP and looking up subscriber records. ISPs targeted by these attacks included Charter Communications, Road Runner, and Comcast, among others. ®